Former Hollywood photographer learned about life from behind the lens

Feb. 22, 2014

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Two months shy of his 92nd birthday, Gil Wilson looks back fondly on a life spent behind the lens.

Growing up in Los Angeles, Wilson — who now calls Fort Collins home — has photographed Hollywood stars for movie magazines, crime scenes for the L.A. Police Department and bombing runs from the belly of a WWII bomber.

He got his start in junior high, enthralled with an advertisement for a Univex camera. Saving up to buy it, he asked his father for help developing the film. His father, an art teacher, connected him with a science teacher he knew who also owned a photo studio.

Under his tutelage, Wilson learned not only to develop film but also to shoot photos. His first assignment — a track meet — did not go well.

“I missed the finish on every picture,” he laughed, as did his teacher, who told him, “Well, you learned something; you’ll never do that again. And it was true, I never did do that again.”

Practice made perfect. In high school, Wilson was shooting high school sports for the L.A. Times, earning $2 to $5 for every picture they ran.

At 18, Wilson volunteered with the U.S. Army Air Forces. While his commanding officers originally had him pegged to be an air mechanic, he quickly found the base’s photo studio. Eventually, he was transferred to a base in Culver City, Calif. where they made training films. One of his commanding officers was none other than Lt. Ronald Reagan. Yep, that Ronald Reagan.

His main recollection of the movie star who later would become president was as a fatherly type. Reagan even tried to talk him out of joining a combat photo crew to shoot in China. “He said, ‘Why do you want to go to China? You got it made here. A bunk right on Sound Stage Five. You can go home every weekend and see your folks ... Son, you go home this weekend and talk to your mom and dad and see what they think.’ ”

Wilson went home that weekend but never said a word to his parents about China. When he reported back to Reagan that Monday morning, he simply said, “They just think it would be great if I could go to China.”

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Not long after, Wilson was assigned to the crew and began flight training from Hollywood stunt pilot Paul Mantz.

“That was an experience flying with him,” he said.

Wilson completed 24 missions, photographing bombing runs from an opening in the belly of the plane. His last mission was flown Aug. 8, 1945, one day before the United States dropped the second atomic bomb on Japan.

After the B-25 he was in was attacked by Japanese fighter planes, Wilson and the crew were forced to parachute from the damaged plane. After working to rescue another crew member who was stuck in a tree with a badly broken leg, he received a bronze star and soon returned to civilian life, Hollywood and that former photography teacher.

On a tip from one of the teacher’s former students, Wilson nabbed a job shooting for a movie magazine, photographing the likes of Bob Hope, Jack Benny and Robert Mitchum. One of his first assignments was shooting the birthday party of a teenage Elizabeth Taylor. Wanting to thank the student, he set up a meeting at a restaurant. He wasn’t prepared for the student to be a woman.

“She was the only professional photographer — lady photographer — in Hollywood at that time,” he said of Beverly, a photographer for Photoplay Magazine.

Sixty-four years and four sons later, Wilson lost Beverly to cancer. Three years later, he still tears up when he talks about the red head he met that day at the restaurant on La Cienega Boulevard.

During their time in Hollywood, the couple photographed everyone from Red Skelton to Howard Hughes, who befriended the newlyweds and, as a surprise, had their new completely empty apartment fully furnished.

Skelton, who also had become a good friend to the couple, often would walk around the studio lot with them. One of Wilson’s favorite photos, which still hangs on the wall of his Fort Collins home, is of Beverly with Skelton — who during a photo shoot insisted that “before we go any further, us two red heads need to have our picture taken.”

While his life would take a multitude of turns — Wilson left the stars of Hollywood for a more stable job as a crime scene photographer and detective with the LAPD, and later became a salesperson with the Rexall chain of drug stores.

He came to Fort Collins after the company’s owner gave him a store in Fort Collins. Eventually he ran several drugstores and local businesses, including making artificial rocks using a technique he’d picked up on Hollywood movie sets.

“I’ve retired I guess three different times,” he joked.

Now retired for the last time, Wilson said he doesn’t pick up the camera very much anymore. Photography has changed so much since the digital age, something he appreciates but doesn’t necessarily want to put his focus on.

Still, one can see on his face how much he loved that time in his life as he talks about racing over to the Mocambo with a pack of other photographers upon hearing about Frank Sinatra getting into a fight (not true) or talking the notoriously camera-shy Al Jolson into letting him photograph him.